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I downloaded this “Happy Birthday” cake bunting, for free, and then attached it to a few strands of baker’s twine and some wooden skewers. This is just your very basic cake bunting – if you look around, you can find some adorable cake bunting ideas to match virtually any theme. Super easy to put together and will fancy-up even a store-bought cake if you are in a pinch.

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I made Rice Krispie Treats for my little guys this week and it got me thinking…these could make a cute and easy party favor! I looked around on the internet and there are tons of ideas. Here are a few of my favorites. If you click on the links below the pictures it will give you the directions. (And if you are really in a hurry – you can just buy pre-made Rice Krispie Treats and use them.) Enjoy!

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Are you looking for a quick Valentine treat for your kiddos that you can have done by the time they get home from school? Look no further – I’ve done a little research and found these two treats which are both quick, easy and don’t involve any baking at all!

These first treats are made from Oreo Cakesters …just use a small heart cookie cutter and you are done. I don’t think that can get any easier!

For Bakerella’s directions click here and scroll down to the bottom of her post.

These second treats are marshmallow lollipops. So cute and can double as your centerpiece for dinner!

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Here are pictures of the cookies I made for our Pumpkin Carving Party this year. Spiderwebs and ghosts – always a big hit with the kids!

I also made these Chocolate Caramel cookies that were delish – a rolo was inside so how could that not be good, right? You could also use Reese’s peanut butter cups or really any chocolate candy with filling. Click here for the recipe for these treats. Enjoy!

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Looking for some easy Halloween Treats that don’t require any baking? Here are two fun ideas that look great, taste yummy and can double as an art project with the kids! All of the ingredients for these treats can be store-bought. They even sell frosting in tubes with piping tips – so yes, you can do this!

Chocolate Witch Hats

These cuties are made from chocolate sugar cones, chocolate chip cookies and chocolate frosting! Click on this link – Super-Speedy Halloween Treats – for the directions and a ton more Halloween treat ideas!

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So, my little guy wanted a dragon cake for his birthday and he wanted me to make a big dragon (that breathed real fire??) for the top of the cake. I’m a baker – not an artist/sculptor – so the whole sculpting a large dragon out of fondant was definitely out and I had to find a different way to make this happen. I wanted to do something more than just having a picture transferred onto the cake using a frosting sheet and edible ink – so I decided on a frozen buttercream transfer. After watching a few videos on how to do it, I gave it a go.

I printed a picture of a dragon I liked (from a kids coloring page site) and traced it onto wax paper. The dragon I picked was holding a flower, so when I traced it onto the wax paper I just drew in a cupcake instead. I got all of my buttercream colored and into the piping bags and then taped the wax paper onto a small cookie sheet so I could work on a hard surface. (If you are trying this, make sure you flip the wax paper upside down before taping it down because you will be piping right onto the wax paper and don’t want to do it on the side with the ink.)

I started by piping the outline with Wilton’s black icing that comes in a tube. I ALWAYS make my own buttercream – but I opted on using this (just for the outline) because it’s really tough to get buttercream really black without adding a ton of coloring and it changes the consistency and taste of the buttercream. Yuck. Plus, I read that some people had a problem with their black buttercream bleeding and that the Wilton icing didn’t do this. So that’s that. Next I piped in all the colors, and kind of pushed the buttercream down with a little knife to make sure it filled in the outline completely. The whole process took about two hours – not including actually making the cake and the buttercream.

After I was finished, I put the whole cookie sheet right into one of my freezers and left it there until about two hours before I served the cake. (The buttercream transfer needs to freeze for at least three hours I would think – but mine was in there overnight.) About two hours before I served the cake, I took the transfer out of the freezer and just flipped it over onto my frosted cake and peeled off the wax paper.

These are not the greatest quality pictures – but here is the original picture that I printed out and colored for a guide (I ended up changing the green to purple though on the actual transfer).

Here is the frozen buttercream transfer on the cake! It was a lemon pound cake with blackberry filling iced with lemon buttercream. Nothing fancy – just in a 9 x 13 pan. I was happy with how it came up for my first try and, most importantly, my little guy got a cake with a dragon on it!

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I was looking for a way to use up some Kraft caramels that I had left over from my son’s class holiday party and I found this easy recipe. By the way, I am talking about the chewy caramels – not hard candy! I used my own brownie recipe – but I suppose you could use a *gasp* box mix if you wanted to :)

1) Line your 8×8 brownie pan with parchment paper (so the paper comes out over the sides).

2) Use whatever brownie recipe you like, pour the batter right into the lined pan and bake accordingly.

3) When the brownies are almost finished baking, start melting about half a bag of the caramels in the microwave (approximately 2 1/2 minutes), add 2 tbsp of milk and then stir until it has a nice creamy consistency.

4) After taking the brownies out of your oven, spread the caramel mixture right on top and then sprinkle on whatever extra little treats you want. I chose chocolate chips – but you could do nuts, chocolate chunks, coconut, a combination of these things, etc.

5) Let the brownies completely cool and then just use the overhanging parchment paper to lift the brownies right out of you pan, cut into squares and ENJOY!

They were easy, super yummy and let me tell you, these suckers went fast!

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The boys had been asking me to buy the Gingerbread House Kit since it came out (in October?!) every time we went to the grocery store. I always bake everything from scratch – but I just couldn’t refuse their cute faces, finally caved and bought it last week. Everything you need comes in the box – the gingerbread pieces, the decorations and even the icing is already made – so it’s really pretty easy. I also used some other sprinkles and sugar crystals that I had here already.

The one thing that makes a huge difference when you are decorating these houses is a pastry bag! Using a knife for the icing can be very messy and you just can’t add any fine details with a knife. I transferred the icing that came in the box to my own pastry bag and used both a #10 tip to “glue” the walls and roof together, and a #3 tip for the actual decorating. But, since most people don’t have a bunch of pastry bags lying around, you can use the bag the icing comes in. This works fine when you are putting the house together. Just cut off the corner and squeeze the icing out to glue the bottom layer and walls together.

Once you have put the house together, let it dry for at least 30 minutes. While it’s drying, transfer the rest of the icing into a freezer bag and cut off just a tiny bit of one of the corners and use that to pipe the details on the roof, windows and doors. The freezer bag with give you better control and the smaller hole will make it easier to pipe thinner lines. My little guys are getting pretty good with a pastry bag, but I did help (a lot) with the decorative piping on the roof and the windows. The rest of the decorating kudos goes to them though!

And there you have it! A super fun and relatively easy project to do with the kids! Happy Holidays!